Having released a unique range of fibre-free, thermo reflective insulation products in 1997, Malaga-based Air-Cell Insulation Products is celebrating its 10th year in business with impressive growth and an extensive international distribution network.
Having released a unique range of fibre-free, thermo reflective insulation products in 1997, Malaga-based Air-Cell Insulation Products is celebrating its 10th year in business with impressive growth and an extensive international distribution network.
Company founder and chairman Brian Tikey, and managing director Scott Gibson, who joined in 1998, agreed that while the company had built a strong reputation in the marketplace, the road had at times been a bumpy one.
The company, which started in an Osborne Park garage, now has 40 staff across Australia, including its Western Australian head office and eastern states manufacturing facilities, and is expecting to realise a turnover of more than $15 million this year.
With distributors in every Australian state, New Zealand, Asia and the Middle East, Air-Cell exports to Indonesia, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the Phillipines and Malaysia.
Servicing both the residential and commercial markets, Air-Cell wasn’t received with open arms by the industry’s dominant players when it entered the marketplace 10 years ago.
The three major insulation companies, which held about 80 per cent of the market in the late 1990s, aggressively defended their market share from new players, including Air-Cell.
The company says the big players put a lot of pressure on Air-Cell in the early years, including legal threats and advertising campaigns attacking its credibility.
“It was very disruptive,” Mr Gibson told WA Business News.
“[That type of] behaviour is something small companies going into a large market have to overcome.”
Contacting the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and attaining CodeMark certification, one of the building industry’s highest level of product conformance, went much of the way to releasing this pressure from the major players.
Air-Cell’s commitment to compliance has since proved an effective competitive advantage.
“We promote at every opportunity our compliance to Australian standards,” Mr Tiker said.
Now with about 3 per cent of the Australian insulation market, Air-Cell is looking to take advantage of the growing awareness of energy efficiency and green building practices, an area the company has been active in for about five years.
Now, the directors say, one of their biggest challenges is protecting their intellectual property and preventing imitation products, locally produced or imported, from coming onto the market.
Air-Cell diligently monitors the arrival of cheaper products, usually sold as a competitive product with the same features and benefits, which claim to meet compliance standards.
Air-Cell has mounted two legal claims against patent breaches, and was successful in both.
Mr Gibson said that, with research and development a major part of Air-Cell’s business strategy, protecting its IP was a high priority.
“The cheapest thing you can ever do [to protect IP] is to get a patent. You also have to have the will to defend it,” he said.
Mr Gibson said having strong legal support and advice, despite being expensive, was key to the company’s successful prosecutions.
Strong market and industry intelligence, both domestically and internationally through distributors and sales agents on the ground, was vital in monitoring what products were likely to breach Air-Cell’s patents, he said.
“We’re looking at the competition landscape all the time, we’re looking at R&D landscape all the time. We need to keep informed on all levels,” Mr Gibson said.
“We know who all the international players are, we have strong relationships with all of the international manufacturers.”
